Monday, January 25, 2010

rockstar for a weekend

Back from a whirlwind in San Francisco. Salons, champagne, old and new friends, private performances, exclusive gallery events, celebrities -- it was a little taste of being a rockstar. (My collaborator, Steve Wagner, is the best host ever.) It's strange and good to come home, and it makes my life here seem calm in comparison.

On Thursday I performed at a private Salon in Sunset to an incredibly attentive, listening audience. I even managed to unload a few books to this intimate crowd. Then on Friday I swung by Lower Haight to stop into Cafe International for their open mic. I met up with one of the three people I still keep in contact with, my brother's best man, Orestis, and we drank whiskey at Molotov's till my jet lag turned me into a nodding pumpkin.

Then the big day -- the show at SFAE. We wound up drinking across the street from the gallery at the Clift Hotel with a Fellini-esque assortment of musicians, artists, and scientists.

Being in the same room as Brian Wilson, a Talking Head, and the artist who did the cover of The Dark Side of the Moon (whose given name, hand-to-god, is Storm Thorgerson) is, in case you wondered, not that surreal at all. If anything, it's weird how normal it is. Like it's a room full of any other group of people, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. I guess the weirdest part is knowing you should feel weird. The idea that someone should feel uncomfortable and/or privileged to be included in such a coterie.